My wife and I have been using Airbnb for the last three years. We have stayed at accommodations in the United States, Korea and Greece.
It would seem that Airbnb is now doing criminal background checks on all new and old customers when they make reservations. They are using a company called: Inflection Risk Solutions, LLC.
On November 30th I received this email from Airbnb after making a reservation in Costa Rica:
“Thank you for your request to make a reservation or activate a listing using Airbnb’s platform. We have now completed an evaluation of your Airbnb account, which included a consumer report generated using the Inflection SafeDecision API product offered by Inflection Risk Solutions, LLC.
We regret to inform you that, at this time, Airbnb, Inc. has made the determination to permanently deactivate your account due, at least in part, to the following information contained in that consumer report:
- Criminal Records Match
Inflection SafeDecision API provided information used to make this determination and took no part in making the decision to decline your application, and cannot explain why the decision was made.
You have a right under the Fair Credit Reporting Act to know the information contained in your consumer report at Inflection SafeDecision API and to:
- request a free copy of your consumer report from Inflection SafeDecision API within sixty (60) days of this notice; and
- dispute any inaccurate or incomplete information contained in your consumer report directly with Inflection SafeDecision API
A summary of your rights under FCRA is available at this link. You can access the report used in making this determination and initiate any dispute process, as needed, on the Inflection SafeDecision API site by clicking this link.
You can also request a free copy of your report or initiate the dispute process by contacting Inflection SafeDecision API directly:
Inflection Risk Solutions, LLC
P.O. Box 391146
Omaha, NE 68139
Phone: 1–855–278–7451
Email: support@inflection.com
Please include Application Unit ID #: 9576311f-8984–4f04–9ae6–43b6e729dda4 in any communication so Inflection SafeDecision API can identify the consumer report. If you believe your consumer report contains errors, once you’ve worked with Inflection SafeDecision API to correct them, we will be notified and can move forward with reviewing your account reinstatement request.
Please note that any upcoming reservations will be canceled for a full refund and all other parties will be notified.
We’ll contact you if anything changes in the future, but until then, we won’t be able to assist you any further with your account issues. Please see our Help Center for further information: www.airbnb.com/help/article/432.
Sincerely, “
This email really floored me. I plead guilty to a misdemeanor traffic offense in 2016, and after looking at what Inflection Risk Solutions LLC provided Airbnb in their report I decided to go through the “Dispute Process”. I filled out the dispute form which included my Social Security Number, which I left blank, and sent it in. I was not about to give them that kind of sensitive information and was advised by my attorney not do so.
Inflection responded that they could not process the dispute without it. When asked why they needed it, I was told it was to eliminate any other person with the same name and birth date. I responded to them stating that there was no need to eliminate anybody, that the information in their report was correct except for that of the final finding in the court case. Initially there were three charges brought against me, but the “final” court finding was only the misdemeanor, not all the charges they provided to Airbnb.
I received another email from Inflection stating that they still could not process the dispute without the SSN. So essentially the reason they said they needed my SSN was not true at all, making me especially wary of them.
So to settle the matter for good I sent them a copy of the “actual court findings” since they did not seem to have access to those records.
I received a reply thanking me for the “actual court findings” , but they still needed my SSN. I told them that my attorney advised me not to provide it.
Their response was to call them, with my attorney present. At this point, I was not willing to try and do this as we are separated by 7,771 miles since I’m out of the country.
After this I just gave up on the dispute. After all it is highly unlikely that Airbnb would reinstate my account anyway.
So………….since Airbnb has the most listings for houses around the world, and we still wanted to rent the place in Costa Rica, my wife signed up for an account with Airbnb. She attempted to make reservations for the same place and same time period, but it was no longer available for when we wanted it. So she found another host property and booked it. She wrote to the host asking about the conflicting information about the kitchen shown in the photos, but missing in the “Amenities” section of her listing. According to the site information, the host is supposed to respond within 24 hours. After three days there was still no response, so she tried to get into her account to write again, but her account seemed frozen and she could not get into it. She waited a couple of more days and finally called Airbnb asking what was up. She was told she would get a response within 48 hours. This is the response she got:
_______________________________________________________________
“We wanted to reach out to you regarding your Airbnb account. After a routine review, we regret to inform you that we are no longer able to support your Airbnb account due to violations of our Terms of Service. You can find additional information about our Terms of Service here: www.airbnb.com/terms.
As a result of this determination, we have permanently deactivated your account. Please note that any upcoming reservations will be canceled for a full refund and all affected parties will be notified. Additionally, further account support will no longer be available.
For more information about account deactivations, please visit: https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/432.
We hope you understand that this decision is exercised at our sole discretion and that we are not obligated to provide an explanation as to the action taken against your account, nor are we liable to a user in any way with respect to deactivating or canceling his or her account.
We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.
Respectfully,
Morris
www.airbnb.com/help"
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Four days later there was still no refund, so she wrote asking why they have not refunded her money.
Two days go by and still no refund or response to the inquiry. So she called them and the person she talked to told her that her concerns would be forwarded to the correct department and she should receive her refund within 15–20 days. That was yesterday and the refund has not be applied to the credit card yet, but it is a weekend. We shall see , it has been 9 days since the letter of cancellation and they have had the payment for 20 days now.
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So, back to Inflection Risk Solutions, LLC and background checks. My wife did not knowingly violate any “Terms of Service”. Her account was frozen at the same time she had set up her account and made a reservation in Costa Rica. Our take on this is that her background check showed her being my wife and since she made her booking for two people, they were assuming I was the second person. We believe this must be why her account and reservation was cancelled. WOW.
Since my 2016 misdemeanor charge my wife and I have stayed in two Airbnb accommodations, one in Korea and one in Greece. I believe their routine background checks are a relatively new thing since I was able to successfully make two bookings after 2016.
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We are in total agreement that Airbnb should not be able to operate without any oversight or regulation. They are way out of control with their policy of users being disposable without a shred of appeal or due process. We strongly feel that this is discrimination when they claim no discrimination is allowable for their bookings.
The internet is full of issues relating to their background checks and the inaccuracy of the reports Airbnb received, with the result of people losing their accounts and their reservations, with no explanation. How can this even be legal?
To close, at least we won’t ever have to deal with this unethical company again and suffer the stress related to arbitrary decisions like we’ve experienced.
We can be happy to know that Airbnb is being sued by the family of the very unlucky lady who was killed by one of their employees. We hope the family asks for millions of dollars and that they must pay and perhaps even go broke.
